Why does my external HD's speeds suck so bad?

[bigempty]

I am running a Western Digital Caviar SE 320 GB IDE UltraATA/100 in a Mad Dog USB 2.0 enclosure.

Right now I am transfering 46GB worth of data to it and the best it will do is 7.10 MB/sec.

Shouldn't it be at least twice this speed?

 

[Steve]

Are you connected to a USB 2.0 port?

Go to Device Manager and look at your USB devices at the bottom of the tree, tell us if any say the word "enhanced."

 

[BladeVenom]

If it was USB 1.1, I think it would be slower than that. I think it's the cheap enclosure. My external drive is about half the speed of my internal drives. I can't remember the exact numbers.

 

[Mark R]

7 MB/s is a bit slow. USB 2 normally gets around 15-25 MB/s.

Most likely thing is a cheap enclosure using a poor quality USB chip. However, even the best USB enclosure is only going to be about 1/3 - 1/2 the speed of an internally connected drive (or an eSATA connected external).

 

[kevinf2090]

just wondering, what is the software you use to test hard drive speed. does it work with internal drives too

 

[bigempty]

I swapped it out for a Firewire/USB 2.0 combo enclosure.

Running it off of Firewire made a HUGE difference, I am getting consistent 20 MB/sec transfers now.

kevinf2090: Vista displays the transfer speed.

 

[locutus12]

Originally posted by: kevinf2090
just wondering, what is the software you use to test hard drive speed. does it work with internal drives too

HDTACH will do it.

http://www.simplisoftware.com/Public/index.php?request=HdTach

 

[sdifox]

I use FastCopy. I get sustained 30MBps transferring to and from USB2.0 enclosure

http://www.ipmsg.org/tools/fastcopy.html.en